King Lear - Kenneth Branagh - Wyndham's

I thought this the worst professional production of a Shakespeare play I have ever seen

Why bother to stage Lear if it’s so truncated?

Bizarre

It reminded me of a cheap cast off episode of GOT

And the acting was appalling

Branagh has this odd over enunciation

And the entire cast are reciting lines like a school effort

I do wonder if like KST a few roads away

Branagh is actually over inflated and over rated as an actor m

The mainstay of his career is now playing Poirot

It’s not exactly high art

There is nothing wrong with Poirot

My point is probably he just isn’t that amazing after all

I saw him as Macbeth and Ivanov and also I am sure at the NT in Edmond a long time ago

Both performances today and also Monday evening have been cancelled.

How totally weird given that there is zero wiggle room with this particular run. Maybe Branagh has been dispatched to Westfield or somewhere similar to see if he can buy a soul.

As it’s a RADA benefit show couldn’t he have employed some graduates as understudies ?

It really isn't. It's just turned out not to be one of the greats.. which happens all the time and shouldn't be a big shock but more a gentle disappointment. It makes the great plays even greater by having constant disappointments in-between!

Just wait for Fiennes in Macbeth! That really will be great (probably not).

Presumably it can only be KB that's ill/indisposed. Other parts you would expect could be covered or the action sped up even faster so you don't realise a scene or three's been cut.

I think that people should try and be kind and compassionate instead of writing nasty comments like above ..
Something has obviously happened to someone on the cast for them to cancel the show . I’d imagine if it’s Sir Ken is someone wrote on here he had a cold on Friday and he probs doesn’t have an understudy as he is the reason this show is virtually sold out . I do hope they re accommodate those canx tickets by putting on extra performances .. so many people want to see this.

Re the show I go and watch a lot of London shows and I’ve never commented before …
HOWEVER
I think the reviews on this one are very very harsh . We British don’t like successful people for some reason especially when they are as talented / successful as Sir Ken ..acting / directing / writing lots of Oscar nominations ..
the critics are also Slamming Lyonesse for similar reasons I feel .
Let’s encourage our very successful screen actors to step back on the stage not pull them part when they do ..,
Sir Ken has made this King Lear for the people .. yes it’s commercial and not what you will see at the RSC but frankly last time I watched KL it was far too long and boring being no Shakespeare expert I couldn’t understand it .I’d much rather watch this .

This show is totally different .. Sir Ken and the very talented ex RADA cast make it easy to understand with the pronunciation … it’s shortened yes and 2 hours is long enough . I found it fast moving and extremely well acted . The Stonehenge setting is clever and as he is a young King Lear that makes sense as does the young cast probs all under 35 .
Everyone I was with loved it and there was a standing ovation and loud cheers so I guess the rest of the audience did too .

Looking at the cast list a couple of brand new graduates who were great ( most of the cast have worked quite a lot post Rada )but why shouldn’t he promote the drama school that trained him and where he is President ? Good for him giving these talented young actors a great showcase .


I love Sir Ken’s performance as Lear .. very modern take on it . Almost having a break down in front of us instead of going completely mad .. he is a joy to watch performing Shakespeare for the masses like me . Keeping it simple !
What a wonderful actor and director ( maybe people just don’t like the fact that he does both ?)
My favourites in the rest of the cast are hard to pull out as they are all so good ( credit to Rada training ) but doubling of Cordelia and the Fool just like it was done in Shakespeare times played by Jessica Revell needs a special mention .

I think people will look back at this show and say how lucky they were to see Sir Ken play King Lear at 62 in the West end

A friend of mine who is a Branagh fan and was excited about this production snuck out halfway through despite there not being an interval - I have never known her to leave a show before, so very uncharacteristic. Since she went in well-inclined to the production, I asked what made it unbearable. She said there was no drama or ideas, just a rush of words. She did hear from others the second half was better, so admitted she may have missed the good bits.

Susannah Clapp nailing the bizarre pronunciation going on in this show in today’s Observer reviews (3 geeat write ups, including poor Lyonesse finally too):

“ But why does everyone talk as if they were being jabbed between each word: “What. Is. The. Matter?” Is this ancient Britspeak? The effect is not quite pronounced enough to suggest a distinctive dialect but is more than sufficient to mangle the sense of the verse, with subjects and verbs waving at each other across the gulf of a pause.”

I wonder if Ken feels bad about not directing all the RADA grads well enough? They’ve been slaughtered in the reviews. But then maybe that’s karma for promoting students from a drama school that really doesn’t need to give its students any more legs up?

Exactly my sentiment. Well said.

I think we all disagree with Parsley’s view that this is the worst professional Shakespeare production - those of us who saw the Wooster Group/RSC Troilus and Cressida anyway.